“When I look at the night sky and see the work of your hands-the moon and the stars you set in place-what are mere mortals that you should think about them, human beings that you should care for them?” -Psalm 8:3-4
Hello from Thailand! Thank you for tuning in to a new update! In case you haven’t had a chance to read the latest update previous to this one, our team is in a Burmese bamboo village by the border of Burma in Thailand! This village is so beautiful and so special. Each Monday to Wednesday, we teach English at the school in the village. It is so much fun! I teach the third grade students and love it so much! This week we learned about past and present tense sentences with the examples of caterpillars turning into butterflies and tadpoles into frogs. One of the students found a tadpole in the village and brought it to me in a cup after class, so sweet! On Thursday’s and Friday’s, our team visits nearby villages and people along the way to pray and build friendships.
The people in this village are so beautiful and so fun! A majority of the people in the village are children. Each evening, we gather at the grace house which is a church within the village and the children will sing Burmese songs and then we will sing English songs and back and forth! Then, our team takes turns sharing bible stories each night. After that, we play games, dance, help the children with homework, and gather together and watch cartoons in Thai. It is a dream! There are five black piglets in our village that I adore! My friend Emmy and I got to go into their pen and feed them their dinner! I feel God shows me His love through giving me animals to see and take care of. I love animals so much and village life has lots of animals to love! The children sing to God each morning at sunrise at the grace house, in the afternoons, and in the evenings with all their heart and soul. It is so beautiful! We watched The Little Mermaid this week at the grace house and one of the little boys loves mermaids and he held a fork during the movie just like Ariel’s thingamabober! He was filled with so much joy!
I love watching the dynamics of motherhood around the world. It reminds me so much of my mom and all the moms I have been blessed to watch care for their children. There is a woman in our village named Elizabeth and she has two adorable kids. One evening when we were in her home in the evening during homework and cartoon time hour, I watched as she helped her children with homework and getting ready for the next day and cleaning up her home, it resembled motherhood that I have seen in my home country, in other countries, and in my own childhood home. Seeing Elizabeth in action displayed that people around the world are so similar. A mother in a bamboo village in Thailand is identical to my mother in Spokane, Washington and moms all around the world. Amazing!
This week, my friend Kim and I were reading on our porch when two European men about thirty and fifty years old arrived at our porch. They asked if they could sit down while they took a break while in search of the Kayan village, a people group and village with long necks and gold neck rings, they live in the village before ours and sell delicious cookies and snacks! They sat down on our porch and saw a book called the Explicit Gospel our team has been reading. One of the men asked, “How come it is explicit? What is the gospel?” My heart leaped! This is the perfect situation to share the gospel! My friend Kim and I shared the gospel and answered questions to the best of our ability. They asked really good and challenging questions! At the end of our time of about an hour, the men shared their beliefs with us that they do not believe in God, yet that they were very interested in what they had heard. You could see in their eyes that they were searching for what could be something greater. It was so awesome to see how God is pursuing two European men in the jungles of Thailand, He can even use wrong coordinates to a village, to plant seeds. He really is chasing after all of us so passionately.
Another man came into our village from Germany. My friend Kim and him bonded right away since she lived in Germany for three years during her child hood. This man once came to this village and found the bamboo hut that we are living in and asked in the village if he could live there for the month since it was empty and the village welcomed him with open arms! He cooked his meals under the deck and the village would come and help him cook. He was so touched too by how the children worship and love Jesus so passionately. When this man was a child, he survived a gas explosion after 22 procedures and experienced many loved ones passing aways. He now travels and explores around Thailand. My friend Kim saw that he was in need of refreshment and the man shared his favorite verses in German and Kim went and found the verses to give to this man. They laughed, cried, and shared stories with each other. In his eyes, she said, you could see his heart and the depths of what his life has held. God is so powerful in orchestrating people to meet and refresh each other.
Thank you so much for reading this update! Have an amazing week! 🙂
“The heavens proclaim the glory of God. The skies display his craftsmanship. Day after day they continue to speak; night after night they make him known. They speak without a sound or a word; their voice is never heard. Yet their message has gone throughout the earth, and their words to all the world.” -Psalm 19:1-4
